Ramadan in Virtue: Fast and Furious

Ramadan in Virtue: Fast and Furious

As every year, Ramadan comes with all the festivities that surrounds us in and out. It comes with all them memories of childhood and family unions. Lights, and long nights and above all, you see Jerusalem dressing in a festive mode. As every year as well, and maybe as with every such occasion, it […]

As every year, Ramadan comes with all the festivities that surrounds us in and out. It comes with all them memories of childhood and family unions. Lights, and long nights and above all, you see Jerusalem dressing in a festive mode.
As every year as well, and maybe as with every such occasion, it is important to take a pause and think, Contemplate, and reflect.
Ramadan is supposed to be the month of contemplation.
However, as every year, and as the situation in every similar occasion, we lose track of the meaning behind things and follow rigid rituals that end up in showing the worse in us.
I am someone who stopped fasting since years, partly in my way of protesting rules, and partly because I just cannot drink water. However, mostly because my relationship with the creator has taken a different shape, and above all, I learned that we do not fast the way we were asked to, if the Qur’an is my guide to belief and rituals.
However, then I try to think of what we perform, as years and days pass with the deterioration on all levels in the Arab-Islamic world mainly, people are losing faith. However, yet, they still fast for instance. When you think of a month of fasting for young children who are forced to fast, and people who suffer to fast, and then you see this state of greed in eating afterward you cannot but question the virtue of this act.
As usual, I had to go back to the Quran. That inner faithful creature inside me refuses to give up, and I have to say that my belief is reliable. Questioning from e is part of a search for truth, and this is part of us being on this earth . and since a long time, I start my search from the Qur’an when it comes to such matters. It is also part of my conviction maybe, I settled on Islam as a faith, after all, I came to life with this package.
So going to the Quran and checking the verses in relevance, it was once again a proof that we do not practice what the Quran says . the verses on fasting as crystal clear ,and as in many other cases, the Jurists of Islam decided to choose what they wanted and force us into a set up that is not necessary for line. Moreover, as always, I keep my right in understanding and interpreting in my capacity, which is also the another rule of Islam.
However, then you realize, that nobody cares. It is one another time when you look at yourself, and you sound odd and in disbelief… well, the word is dis-believer. Moreover, the verses you are weighing your proof on are meaningless inform of the rule of norms and traditions.
As always, I insist that , it is my duty as a devout Muslim to say what I believe is right, to deliver a message of goodness to this religion within all the abuses that we Muslims cause it . and I admit it is difficult, problematic, and with each article, I think, this could be the one that will get me to the edge . and yet, I insist.
Moreover, of course believing that I am a “preacher” and someone who has influence, I think I should affect the people closer to me, my family. So, of course, I start my lectures of philosophizing Islam according to them, which in fact explaining the truth, and I only use the Quran as a source, not because I deny the Sunnah, but because such a situation does not intervention fro the Sunnah, the Quran is very clear.
Of course the first word I hear: O my God, stop it, you cannot say this. I would say: I am not the one saying this, it is the Quran. I will hear: O God, please forgive her …
Today, I was reactive to news that said: the General attorney declared that who over is not fasting in public will be sentenced to a one month in prison.
I could not but write about it immediately, this is not just a breaching of law, and of Islam, and of human rights. It is a violation of freedom of the other . in this case the direct other is the Christian, how dare anyone set up such a sanction? Why do the whole population need to suffer if people are fasting? Fasting or not fasting is like wearing the hijab. You are free to wear, and you are free not to wear. Why do I have to suffer, if I am not fasting? Fasting is something that is related to the person who wants to fast; it is not about the environment around him.
Instead of doing this, they should minimize the acts of greed that we witness in the streets before and after the iftar with no sense or sensitivity to the poor people who can not afford the luxury of Ramadan.
After all, Ramadan is a month where we are supposed to feel with the poor. Another question that I asked for an answer on in my article before, if fasting is for the rich to feel with the poor, does this mean that poor people should not fast?
Of course, these questions put me under scrutiny. They make e doubted, and the verses I mention as a proof suddenly turns in my tongue to the listener to satanic.
As I was doing my course of preaching on the iftar today, I started expressing my irritation on the issue. The opinions split between supporting the idea of sanctions and refusing it. I have to say that I was mad, how can anyone approve such an act. We are supposed t obe a secular, liberal family. I was thinking if I am writing what I am writing thinking of influences, and I am anxious sometimes, and here I am sitting at a table with my family who is supporting what I strongly disapprove of.
As the discussion deteriorated and, my fasting father was fuming, after all, I started this Ramadan with my anti- fasting traditionally, and my father was getting on the edge of dealing with me. Moreover, somehow I test what I say on him; he is a devout Muslim, and he never pushes what he believes in on others. However, this time I seemed to have pushed him a lot, and he was asking me to shut up. Moreover, of course, I would not. As the discussion went to a deteriorating mode, and I became the daughter nad he became the father, I realized I was 45, and he cannot talk to me like. I was struggling to maintain my right into believing in what I believe in, and I could not but think of why we Muslims are being accused of being radicals and backward. As I was struggling to try to get myself into the track of the discussion or actually stopping it, I was feeling myself getting more and more pushed , I was thinking, how dare he ask me to shut up , and tell me all that he was telling me, all that I was saying was within the limit of the Quran itself, I was not saying anything against God or the prophet or the Quran or anything . I was objecting the law that enforces such false rules a violates rights and freedoms. I just heard myself, trying to keep my freedom of expression in place, don’t talk to me this way. The last thing I remember within my screams was that he slapped me. I was in a shock that he did it, and I was thinking, that I had to submit to that power of him being a father and I could not. I felt violated, and I still resisted. But somehow a tear blocked in my eye. I could not let it fall.. after all my father has always been one of my rare allies… I lost him for fasting discussion … it was more of a Fast, and a Furious heated end of reaching to the best of that proclaimed reach out to God.
And then we wonder how Da’esh is fostered.

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Reblogged this on Ned Hamson's Second Line View of the News and commented:
So sorry you had to fall out with your father or anyone else to stand for your beliefs. My hope is that upon “reflection,” he and others will love you for just being you and not who they might wish you be for them.

thank once again for your brutal and compassonate honesty.. please read my INTERFAITH PEACE TREATY and let me add your name as a signatory if you wish to sign it.. you are not alone.. (: https://interfaithpeacetreaty.wordpress.com/